WP Op-Ed: Stuck Like Lyndon

By Harold Meyerson
Wednesday, September 10, 2003; Page A19

....Like Lyndon Johnson, Bush has gotten us stuck in a no-win conflict in a distant land, and, as they did during Johnson's war, the American people know it. The action, thankfully, is nowhere near so bloody now as it was then, and partly for that reason hardly anyone is demanding, as Americans did of Johnson, that Bush bring all the troops home right now. The American left as well as the American right understands that we have a moral obligation to help rebuild Iraq, though liberals believe that task will be more readily accomplished when under a genuinely international aegis.

There will be arguments over how to come up with an additional $87 billion for Iraq but not, I suspect, much argument over our obligation to provide substantial funding for reconstruction. Even if we strike a deal with the French and persuade the Pakistanis to stand guard over the oil pipelines, it will be U.S. taxpayers who'll finance the sentry duty.

But stuck is stuck, and the American people do not take kindly to leaders who squander U.S. lives and treasure for a cause that seems remote from U.S. interests. As Johnson did with Vietnam, Bush sought to depict the current action in Iraq as necessary to safeguarding our shores.

snip

Stuck in Iraq, stuck at home and the polling shows that the American people increasingly realize it and lay the blame on Bush.

more at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A51929-2003Sep9.html

Lots of great points all in one place.

Example,

"The president will have to deliver a more persuasive speech than he did Sunday, however, if he's to convince Americans that our checkpoints in Tikrit somehow enhance our homeland security."

Thanks.

New Hampshire primary? Followed by those great words, "I will not...."